Did Thurston County’s homeless population actually decrease? Here’s what’s missing
Thurston County’s homeless population likely didn’t decrease despite a lower census count this year, but the true numbers are difficult to determine.
If you just look at the data, the number of people experiencing homelessness in Thurston County seemingly fell from 1,145 people in January 2021 to 766 people in February 2022. Yet that’s far from the whole story.
The point-in-time count has historically undercounted the homeless population, making comparisons difficult. Annual changes to how the count is conducted and varying engagement make year-to year trends difficult to pin down, said Arielle Benson, a homeless program specialist at Thurston County.
“While it’s one of our best kind of touch points for those that are living unsheltered in our community, it’s also just really challenging to make those year-over-year assumptions,” Benson said. “We change methodology as we learn every year.”
If you make assumptions about undercounts, she said one could argue the census numbers are holding relatively steady over the last few years.
“Even with methodology changes, we’re not seeing a huge significant increase or decrease either way,” Benson said.
Tye Gundel, program coordinator for Olympia Mutual Aid Partners, said her organization has seen more people experiencing homelessness this year than in previous years.
“Since the pandemic, I think we’ve seen a sharper increase, especially with newer people, but overall, over the last three to five years, it’s felt like a steady increase.”
Anecdotally, Gundel said many people have been displaced by apartments being bought, renovated and later sold or rented at higher prices.
Others have been displaced due to domestic violence, Gundel said. Notably, the preliminary census indicates 17% of those surveyed experienced domestic violence.
A lack of permanent supportive housing also has driven some to live unsheltered, Gundel said.
“We have higher numbers of people who are chronically homeless, and those folks are not moving into housing because there’s very few new spaces being created,” Gundel said.
Even though the census recorded fewer people experiencing homelessness this year, Benson said this should not affect funding for efforts to address homelessness.
“There are a lot of weaknesses with it as a methodology that everyone kind of understands,” Benson said. “As a nation, we have not come up with a better way to measure that.”
Census challenges
This year staff opted to ask people it was counting to answer an abbreviated survey, unlike last year when anyone staff could observe living unsheltered was counted. That contributed to the comparative undercount.
“We had almost 100 folks refuse consent in some form or other and those were folks that were even willing to participate in the survey in the first place,” Benson said. “A good number of folks that we saw were just not interested in participating or doing the survey.”
Benson said the county also did not host any events this year, which typically drive engagement. This was partly due to the surge in COVID-19 cases earlier this year that delayed the census by a month.
“There was still a lot of COVID hesitancy around engagement,” Benson said. “We didn’t do any events, really wanting to minimize that interpersonal interaction so that we weren’t spreading COVID across the community.”
The impact of events may best be shown by the numbers surveyed in Yelm. Benson said Love Abounds Here, a homeless advocacy non-profit, helped sponsor a monthly service event at the Yelm Community Center that overlapped with the point-in-time census.
As a result, 56 unsheltered people were surveyed in Yelm. For comparison, just 25 were surveyed in Lacey and only one in Tumwater.
For Tumwater, Benson said the county partnered with the city to map out known sites where campers flow in and out. But they had a difficult time finding people at those sites, let alone willing participants.
“It’s a methodological thing, right?” Benson said. “We go out into the encampments and if people aren’t there, we can’t count them.”
One reason fewer people were counted in Tumwater may have to do with how housing insecurity manifests there.
Tumwater spokesperson Ann Cook said she thinks more people in Tumwater are struggling with unstable housing situations rather than unsheltered living. Due to this, the city has focused on programs and services that help people remain housed, she said.
“The homeless population is just a little bit different in Tumwater,” Cook said. “Many would suggest that’s due in part because we don’t have the same kind of services that some neighboring cities have, but we similarly don’t have the demand for those kinds of services.”
As one piece of a larger puzzle, Benson said the census helps create a picture of the homeless population across the county. Other resources help fill in the picture, she said.
Many service providers input data into the Homeless Management Information System. Benson said this helps the county know how many people are actively staying in shelters or how many unique outreach contacts providers make.
Data on homeless students can be found in an extensive database kept by the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Information, Benson added.
Despite its faults, the census is not without merit. Gundel said the census provides a baseline for the community to see patterns.
“Even if not everyone is completing the survey, the survey results we do get are important,” Gundel said “The only way we’re going to end homelessness is if we really understand who is experiencing homelessness and why.”
